An intriguing intellectual encounter took place as Marcel
Proust edited and translated John Ruskin's Bible of Amiens. [1]
Although overwhelmed by the physical beauty of the place,
Ruskin was at pains to explain that his real interest lay in the moral
and
historical lessons to be learned: the power of the cathedral to express
the creativity of an entire people; the cathedral in the city; the
cathedral
as the physical expression of a kind of cooperation between man and
God.
He saw the sculpture of the portals as an open book--a sermon from
which
humans, who (he argued) are naturally disposed to the good and the
moral,
could derive clear lessons. Ruskin's approach was, of course, a
characteristic
one in the mid-to-later nineteenth century when much hope was
pinned upon
the reconstruction of a unified Christian society with all its exterior
trappings. The restoration of Amiens Cathedral in the 1850s and
1860s under
Viollet-le-Duc; the construction of many a Gothic Revival church (like
the
late-nineteenth-century church of Saint-Remi of Amiens, in its
details a
clone of the cathedral) are all part of this agenda.

Marcel Proust, on the other hand, although fulsome in his
praise of Ruskin (even wanting a statue of his hero erected in front
of
the portal), accused him of a kind of idolatry or fetishism--of having
aestheticized
the cathedral, constructing a religion of beauty. In dissembling his
real
intentions Ruskin thus deceives his readers. Proust concurred that
Amiens
Cathedral should be considered as a book, but one "written in a
solemn
language where each character is a work of art that nobody can
understand
any more." (my italics) [2]

Proust concluded (elsewhere), "There is no Logos; there
are only hieroglyphs." [3]
This may be true for many people today, but was it always
so?

The Portal of the Beau Dieu. Unification and Division:
Resurrection of the Body and Last Judgement

The overall design of the west faade with its three
portals bearing a complex program of figurative sculpture is no
accident:
the essential dimensions and proportions of the interior are made
manifest
on this, its exterior face (Figs. 106 and 108). Architecture and
sculpture
are here coordinated in an extraordinary way. And at the fulcrum of
this
rigorously conceived composition is Christ. Not a single Christ, but
three
superimposed images in the sculpture of the central portal: the
Beau
Dieu of the central trumeau; Christ, the Judge in the middle lintel
and the apocalyptic Christ at the top of the tympanum (Figs. 24, 111,
132,
133 and 135). [4] In their interaction these three images form an
ideographic
axis that binds the sculptural program together, lending it peculiar
richness
and intensity. The central axis will thus provide both the starting
point
and the end of our exploration of the west portals.

At the summit of the central tympanum is the awesome image
of Christ of the Second Coming: the apocalyptic Christ described by
Saint
John in the first chapter of Revelation (Figs. 132 and 135). [5]
Two swords issue from his mouth while he holds in his hands
two scrolls that disappear into the clouds described by the Revelation
text.
Traces of bright red and blue paint can still be seen in his halo--this
image was once ablaze with color. The finality of Christ's Second
Coming
is underlined by the interruption of the comforting alternation of sun
and
moon--here held by a pair of flanking angels.

Below this terrible image sits Christ the Judge framed in
an architectural canopy (Fig. 135). The central edifice has seven
windows
(painted bright red)--again referring to the apocalyptic text and
encouraging
us to see this as the New Jerusalem. The seven bays of the nave; the
seven
segments of the hemicycle make sense in relation to this central
theme.
The resurrected Christ seen here is not a fearsome or godlike
creature.
With upper body naked except for a fold of drapery covering the left
shoulder,
and with an expression full of humanity, he sits on a low seat (hardly
a
throne) and raises both hands, palms forward. Presumably the
imprints of
the nails in the hands and of the spear in the side were once painted.
The
painted pupils of the wide-open eyes are still apparent. With this
image
a powerful axis is established along the full length of the cathedral
since
this is the sacramental Christ--the body and blood depicted here are
the
same body and blood in the bread and wine transformed on the high
altar
in the Eucharist. [6]
It was at the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 that the Catholic
dogma of transubstantiation was codified. [7]
Evrard de Fouilloy, bishop of Amiens, was a participant at
this council.

Christ is flanked by the intercessors--Mary and John Evangelist--and
angels on either sides bear the instruments of the Passion, cross and
crown
to his right and spear and nails to his left. [8]
The tympanum is framed by eight enclosing voussoirs: two
orders of angels, followed by martyrs, confessors, virgins, apocalyptic
elders, a Tree of Jesse and patriarchs of the Old Testament.

The temporal framework established by the images at the top
of the central tympanum thus corresponds to the end of time as it
can be
known by human beings. The Second Coming of Christ to his new
Jerusalem
will bring the final judgement by Christ, the Son of Man. At that time
all
humans who have ever lived and died will rise from their tombs and
be reconstituted
as corporeal beings. [9]
Although theologians might address the logistical problems
that would attend this re-embodiment, it was left to the ymagiers
,
the sculptors, to picture the process. The corporeality of the
resurrected
body lent itself particularly to the art of the sculptor working in the
three-dimensional medium of stone, assisted by his colleague the
painter,
who rendered the little human bodies in living shades of pink and
red (traces
of the colors are still visible). Naked and semi-naked men and
women, some
still wearing their tomb shrouds, are seen forcing their way out of
the
heavy-lidded sarcophagi in the eight deeply-carved blocks set in
front of
the masonry field of the lower lintel (Fig. 136). The newly-
incorporated
look up and react to imminent events with a variety of emotions--
fear, anticipation;
confusion. Some clasp their hands in prayer. They are surrounded by
trumpeting
angels. In the center stands Michael with his scales (Fig. 137). To be
found
worthy, one needs weight. The right side of the scale (the beholder's
left)
is weighed down with an Agnus Dei and cross while the left
side of
the scale bearing a devil's head rides high. [10]
A devil below interferes with the balance. And at the very
front of the stage, a tiny image of Synagoga, blindfolded, slumps
under
the devil, while under the Agnus Dei, Ecclesia sits up and
points
to her scroll. [11]

The division of saved and damned unfolds in the upper lintel.
The elements of the composition owe much to the words of Saint
Matthew's
Gospel, "Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall
the
sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars
shall
fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken.
And then
shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all
the
tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming
in the
clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his
angels
with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his
elect
from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." [12]
The depiction of saved and damned is organized around the
central fulcrum. To Christ's left a miserable band of naked people is
ushered
off by hairy devils and angels with flaming swords to be masticated
in the
mouth of hell (Fig. 138). [13]
One man staggers under an enormous weight slung around his
neck--a miser punished by his own money bags. Only two women
will share
the fate of this mostly-male group that includes a king and a bishop.
Holding
on to each other they are hustled forward; the two leaders look back
in
anguish, but a hairy arm reaches out from the very mouth of hell as
a devil
pulls them in.

The horrors to be encountered by the damned--strangling,
scalding, cutting and with torture concentrating on the sexual organs-
-are
continued in the lowest elements of the voussoirs. [14]

The community of the elect, a mixed group of men and women
including one crowned figure, are clothed in the same long robes as
the
apostles and prophets in the jambs of the portal below (Fig. 139). The
most
significant temporal note is provided by the image of a friar at the
head
of the procession of elect, clad in a cowled habit tied with a three-
knotted
girdle. His gesture in covering the hands suggests that this might be
Saint
Francis of Assisi himself, who habitually concealed his stigmata. [15]
Saint Peter welcomes him to heaven, depicted here as an over-sized
door attached to a miniscule church with buttresses and spire. Angels
provide
light (candles) and odor (incense burners) and crown the triumphant
Francis
at the very gate of heaven.

Heavenly images are carried over into the bottom of the voussoirs,
matching the infernal scenes on the other side. Thus, we see souls in
Abraham's
bosom, and pairs of people (male and female), some accompanied by
angels,
heading toward heaven. The leading couple (unaccompanied) carries
posies
and birds.

The powerful teleological sequence of images in the tympanum
and lintel transfixes our attention. Step by step we follow the
extraordinary
events unleashed by the Second Coming: our own passage from tomb
and the
dissipation of the body to miraculous reconstitution. We see our own
surprise
and consternation, as we follow the inevitable division, looking
anxiously
for ourselves on the side of the elect. [16]

The binary left-right division of the Judgement is continued
into the jambs of the portal in the form of the wise and foolish
virgins
who are types of elect and damned. [17]
The monumental column figures in the embrasures, however,
together with the central image of the triumphant Christ on the
trumeau,
counteract this left-right division and establish uniformity through
overwhelming
formal sameness (Figs. 130, 131 and 133).

On the trumeau the resurrected Christ has triumphed over
evil and death expressed in the two beasts, leonine and serpentine,
trampled
under his feet (Fig. 133). This is the image popularly known as the
"Beau
Dieu." [18]
His right hand is raised in blessing and the left hand, holding
a book, hitches up the drapery that swathes his waist, creating a
handsome
diagonal cascade of folds. Christ's feet seem to ride forward on the
beasts.
He is placed high above the the visitor and his wide-open eyes stare
out
above us into the middle distance.

Below the triumphant Christ is an aedicule enclosing a crowned
figure, either to be seen as David, composer of the Psalms, or, more
probably,
Solomon, the personification of Old Testament wisdom, a prototype
for the
Logos of the New Testament, that is Christ. Solomon was
thought to
have been the author of the Song of Songs, a most important source
of inspiration
for the Amiens sculptural program, as we shall see later. [19]
The images of the beasts trampled by Christ make specific
reference to Psalm 91, "Thou shalt tread upon the lion and the
adder:
the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under thy
feet." In
the Speculum Ecclesie of Honorius of Autun the sermon for
Palm Sunday
is based upon this text. [20]
The idea of Triumphal Entry (celebrated on Palm Sunday) with
Christ as the door thus lies at the center of the sculptural program
just
as the Easter celebration of the resurrection of Christ's body and the
Eucharist
lie at the center of Catholic dogma and faith.

The stance, drapery and faces of the statues of the Apostles
who line the portal jambs follow the pattern established by the great
prototype
(Figs. 130, 131 and 133). The images of the Apostles are so repetitive
that
only four individuals are readily recognizable: Peter, to Christ's left,
with tightly curled hair and beard, bears a cross, and Paul, to Christ's
right, bald and heavily bearded, with book and sword. [21]
John is young and unbearded and James, next to him, has a
pilgrims's pouch with shells. The others have been identified by their
attributes,
but some ambiguity results from nineteenth-century restorations.
The Apostles
on the right of Christ (our left) all carry books, whereas only one
book
appears on the other side.

The images of the Apostles gain meaning through their multiplicity,
through their attachment to the architectural frame by means of a
column
anchored in the back, and through the perfection of the serial
production
that lends to each member of the group a high degree of likeness one
to
another. The erect stance of each column statue is contrasted with
the contortions
of the supporting figure in the console below.

Within the Augustinian theology of medieval thinkers like
William of Saint-Thierry, likeness conveys the idea of participation--
a
saint's proximity to Christ will be conveyed by physical similitude.
[22]
The key to the achievement of this level of likeness and
proximity to Christ is provided by the way we live--by the choices
made
between virtue and vice. These choices are expressed in the images
in the
low-relief quatrefoils placed below the Apostles (Figs. 130-131). [23]
Here the designer has avoided a binary opposition of virtue
to Christ's right and vice to his left. Although an echo of such a left-
right
division can be found in the book-carrying Apostles and the Wise
Virgins
to Christ's right, in the quatrefoils the virtues and vices are placed
one
above the other: the vices are represented in explicit depictions
placed
in the lower register (vice is more accessible to the visitor than
virtue)
and the virtues by female personifications holding signs in the upper
register.
Thus the path of righteousness is revealed only indirectly through
signs.
One exception to this is Charity: an explicit depiction of the dividing
of a cloak for a poor beggar carries the specifically aminois
memory
of Saint Martin.

The repetitious quality of the quatrefoil frames with their
low-relief images is reminiscent of wax impressions mechanically
produced
through the imprint of a seal. [24]
The same mechanical-looking repetition is inherent in the
low-relief foliate pattern of the lowest level of the embrasures below
the
quatrefoils.

Thus, in the central portal the binary opposition of saved
and damned in the Last Judgement is overwhelmed by the unity
provided by
the lines of Apostles that flank the doorway. In entering sacred space
(Fig.
24) the visitor has joined the company of the elect .

The Portal of the Mother of God

In the south portal of the west faade, known as the
portal of the Mre de Dieu, Mary stands against the
central
trumeau clad in a long, finely-pleated robe, holding her infant son in
the
left hand and with the right hand outstretched as if to welcome
visitors
(Figs. 111 and 126). [25]
This is a triumphant image: Mary, crowned as Queen of Heaven,
tramples a beast (snake's body with woman's head) just as Christ
also tramples
beasts in the central trumeau. Unlike the square-set plinth of the
central
trumeau the plinth of Mary's trumeau presents an angle toward the
front,
seeming to offer less resistance to the passage of visitors. The
trumeau
plinth carries six scenes from the story of Adam and Eve from the
creation
of man and woman to the Original Sin and the Expulsion from the
Garden.
The serpent who tempted Eve is to be understood as the beast
trampled under
foot, for Mary is the New Eve, by whose agency humans may escape
the consequences
of Original Sin. [26]

The statue of Mary is sheltered by a canopy quite unlike
any of the others in the portals of Amiens Cathedral. Above the
canopy a
gabled tabernacle carried by four columns and capped by towerlets
shelters
a box with elaborate clasp and hinges--a depiction of the Ark of the
Covenant.
In the Book of Exodus (Chapter 25) the Ark was a physical
expression of
the contract between God and the Israelites. Its manufacture
followed the
escape from Egypt and from the dangers of the Red Sea and
starvation in
the desert. The Ark signified not merely the Promised Land, but also
the
social, economic and liturgical structure laid down by God. In the
Middle
Ages the Tabernacle of Moses that sheltered the Ark was seen as a
prefiguration
of the Church--just as Mary herself personified the Church.
[27]

Particularly intriguing at Amiens is the resemblance between
the miniature architecture that encloses the Ark and and the
tabernacle
that sheltered the Host upon the high altar. [28]
In this way the manna of the Israelites becomes the
Eucharistic bread of the Christian. [29]
An analogy is made between the container that carries the
eucharistic bread which is the body of Christ and the Virgin Mary
whose
body was the container that carried (the infant) Christ.

The presence of the six seated patriarchs flanking the central
tabernacle in the lowest register reinforces the link established
between
the Jewish and Christian Church. [30]
Moses to the right of the Ark carries the tablets of the
Law (Exodus 20) while Aaron wears a pectoral and diadem as
described in
Exodus 28. The other Old Testament figures (patriarchs/prophets)
are not
defined, but they resemble the prophet Ezechiel in the central
portal.

Thus, the physical presence amongst the Israelites of the
material Ark of the Covenant as a sign of a social and religious
contract
with God is reconciled with the real presence of Christ (in the
Eucharist)
and the miraculous triumph of the Virgin Mary seen in her
Dormition, Assumption
and Triumph depicted above. While all human beings who have ever
died await
the second coming of Christ and the re-assembling of bodies and
souls involved
in resurrection and the Last Judgement, only two are free from the
corruption
of the flesh and the prolonged separation of body and soul associated
with
death, namely Christ and the Virgin Mary. Post-canonical sources
differed
on the question as to how long the Virgin lived after the Crucifixion,
but
there was broad agreement on the circumstances of her Dormition
and Assumption.
[31]
As the disciples gathered around the bed of the stricken
Virgin, Christ himself appeared to summon her to join him,
"And in
this manner Mary's soul went forth out of her body and flew upward
in the
arms of her Son; and she was spared all pain of the body, as she had
been
free from corruption from without." [32]
The body, which emanated a dazzling light, was placed in
a bier and buried to the sound of angelic music. On the third day
Mary's
body was raised from the tomb to be re-united with her
soul.

To the left of the upper lintel Mary, clad in finely crinkled
drapery, lies on a bed-like tomb whose side is decorated with oculi
and
lancets (Figs. 126 and 140). Twelve bearded and robed Apostles
gather around,
their repetitive stooped bodies forming a rhythmic framing pattern
with
two center points There are five Apostles at Mary's feet, each
carrying
a book. Intense expressions of anxiety are evident and one Apostle
clasps
his hand tightly in prayer. A more hopeful group concentrates its
attention
on the Virgin's head. The physical reality of the situation is
emphasized
through the Apostle who lays his hand on the Virgin's breast while
another
bends close to her face to look for signs of life. Their hope is
expressed
by the cross that one of them carries. The sameness of the
sarcophagus in
the right hand scene of the Assumption enhances the miraculous
nature of
the metamorphosis conveyed by this double image (Fig. 141).
Apostles are
gone and in their place are angels providing light and odor (candles
and
incense burners). Although her eyes are still closed, Mary's right
hand
reaches up in an effort to grasp the hand of one of the angels. Her
head
and feet are slightly raised; a gap has opened up between her
levitating
body and the tomb.

In the tympanum Mary sits at the right hand of Christ as
queen of heaven (Figs. 126 and 142). [33]
Christ, crowned and with a book in his left hand, starts
away from his mother almost like an Annunciate Virgin. He raises his
right
hand to bless. Mary, considerably larger than Christ, raises her left
hand
and holds a scepter in her right. She receives her crown from a group
of
three angels who descend from the top of the tympanum. Angels
bear censers
and candles. The composition is framed by three orders of voussoirs
carrying
angels and the kings of the Tree Jesse.

M.-L. Therel emphasized the duality of the temporal framework
of the Triumph of the Virgin. On the one hand the Virgin precedes us.
She
intervenes for us, and she promises to draw us up after her. [34]
But on the other hand, the final triumph of the Church at
the end of time is prefigured by that of the Virgin. Thus, Revelation,
21,
2, "And I, John, saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming
down
from God out of heaven prepared like a bride adorned for her
husband."
[35]
The great mosaic image of the Triumph of the Virgin placed
in the apse of Santa Maria in Trastevere by Innocent II in the 1140s
clearly
conveys this eschatological mood. Thus, the upper band includes
apocalyptic
elements including the seven candlesticks and Alpha and Omega.
This is the
Celestial Jerusalem evoked not directly by a city image, but by the
image
of a bride decked out for her groom.

Variations upon the theme of the Dormition and Assumption
of the Virgin and her triumphal reception in heaven had already
been depicted
in Gothic sculpture at Senlis, Laon, Chartres and (particularly close to
Amiens) Notre-Dame at Paris. Whereas at Senlis the column figures
depict
the typological forebears of the Virgin and Christ, here at Amiens, a
sequence
of figures was chosen from the events that preceded and
accompanied the
birth of Christ. On the right are three pairs of linked figures, each
involving
a different kind of encounter: the angel greets Mary; Mary visits
Elizabeth,
the mother of John Baptist; Mary presents the infant Christ to the
aged
Simeon in the Temple (Fig. 124). The archangel Gabriel assumes a
contrapposto
stance--one of only three examples of this mannered and elegant
posture
on the Amiens west faade. [36]
The drapery of the angel's robe, falling amply to the ground
and covering the feet, is crinkled in a version of the
"antique"
style. Mary's body assumes a light curve in response to the angel.
Head
covered, she wears a simple robe with a brooch at the throat. Folds
are
bolder and more vertical than in the angel. Mary's right hand is
raised
in blessing and she holds a book in the left. On her left is a mirror
image
of herself. Another Mary, clad in exactly the same attire turns to
greet
her cousin Elizabeth. The comparison between two almost identical
images
emphasizes Mary's change of state-- the second figure of Mary to the
right
is clearly seen to bear the infant Christ. Elizabeth wears a bulky robe
tied with a triple-knotted rustic rope--perhaps signifying the austere
life
of her son-to-be. And finally, a third Mary presents the infant Christ
to
Simeon who has respectfully covered his hands. This Mary is quite
different
from the previous two: she has a rather narrow forehead and the
drapery
folds are heavier and clumsier.

The quatrefoils below contain Old Testament typological references
to the Virgin birth (Gideon's fleece, the burning bush that was not
consumed,
Aaron's blossoming staff etc). [37]
Under the Visitation appears the history of Zacharias and
Elizabeth. And below the Presentation, the pagan idols fall from their
columns
in the Flight to Egypt.

The three Magi and Herod dominate the left side of the portal
(Fig. 125). Powerful crowned figures, they are clad in robes whose
vertical
folds are broadly chiselled. Carrying gifts, two of them turn to
present
themselves across the space of the portal to Mary and Christ (in the
trumeau)
while the third lingers to talk with an angrily-scowling Herod. Then
comes
a fourth king--Solomon, with crown and scepter, and carved in very
much
the same fashion. And finally, the Queen of Sheba is clad in softly
crinked
drapery. Sheba and Solomon, like Mary and Christ, are types of bride
and
groom (sponsa and sponsus) expressing the relationship
between
the lover and the best-beloved in the Song of Songs. In the
quatrefoils
under Solomon the enthroned king prays before his temple and
makes gifts
to the Queen of Sheba. [38]
Under the images of the Herod and the Three Kings an extended
narrative sequence includes Old Testament typological references to
the
Epipany as well as the events of the journey and arrival of the Magi.
[39]

The Portal of Saint Firmin

The theme of the north portal of the west faade, dedicated
to Saint Firmin and the college of local saints, is contrasted and
reconciled
with the Virgin portal. Having committed to memory the various
elements
of the Mre de Dieu portal, the visitor is invited to to
compare
them with the corresponding elements of the Saint Firmin portal, and
to
construct appropriate conclusions. This is precisely the kind of play
that
is difficult within the structure of the written text.

Against the trumeau of the north portal stands Firmin, the
first bishop of Amiens (Figs. 111 and 129). He is clad in full episcopal
gear: sandals, alb, fringed stole, dalmatic, chasuble and hood. He
wears
a miter and carries a crozier in the left hand while the right is raised
in blessing. Just as Mary treads the snake (of Original Sin) and Christ
of the central portal treads the asp and basilisc, Firmin treads the
figure
of Sebastianus, the Roman offical responsible for his death.
[40]

The lower lintel of the Saint Firmin portal provides a close
formal parallel to the equivalent zone of the Assumption of the
Virgin portal
(Figs. 126 and 129). There, six seated Old Testament priests flank the
central
tabernacle of the Ark of the Covenant. Here, in the Saint Firmin
portal,
the similar canopy flanked by six seated bishops of the earthly
diocese
of Amiens might be seen as a reliquary shrine. Jewish patriarchs
have become
Christian priests; Mary, the Ark, Ecclesia, and reliquary are
equated
as one and the same.

The invention and translation of the relics of Saint Firmin
are shown in the upper lintel and tympanum, where low-relief
scenes have
been carved in the shallow blocks of stone placed in front of the
masonry
field. In the center of the middle register the fully-clothed body of a
bishop rises out of a diagonally-placed sarcophagus. [41]
How can one fail to recall the similar form of the sarcophagus
and the peculiar head-upwards levitation in the matching scene of
the Assumption
of Mary? Instead of angels around the body, however, here Bishop
Salve and
his followers are illuminated by a central ray of light. [42]
The bishop, wielding a spade, is flanked by three spade-carrying
helpers as well as other companions including a prominent female
figure
wearing a nun's veil. On either side of the central scene are four city
images with people emerging--these are the local cities of
Throuanne,
Cambrai, Noyon and Beauvais mentioned in written accounts of the
miracle.
Notable is the variety inherent in each group of people, including old
people,
adults and children of both sexes. The discovery of the relics is thus
seen
to be an urban affair in which all kinds of people participated just as
described in the text given by the compilers of the Acta
Sanctorum. [43]
The beholder is invited to reflect upon the contrast between
the Celestial City personified in the right portal in the Virgin Mary at
the moment of her triumph and the earthly city placed in local space
and
contemporary time. One is permanent and destined to triumph at the
end of
time; the other is subject to constant change and ultimate
destruction.

The solemn translation of relics into the city of Amiens
is depicted in the tympanum (Fig. 129). As the procession bearing
the relics
returned to the city of Amiens the cold winter's day was
miraculously turned
to warmth. For three hours flowers bloomed and trees became green
with leaves.
[44]
The city gate is seen on the far right; youths climb trees
to gather the fronds of foliage to throw in the triumphal path of the
chsse
while flowers bloom in the grass at the foot of the city wall. The
procession
is led by five choir boys in albs carrying censers and a candle. A boy
points
into the open book that he carries, as if to validate the event through
reference to the written source. Behind come clerks in dalmatics
carrying
a closed book and an arm reliquary. Then follows (carved in a
separate block
of stone) the steep-crested chsse of Saint Firmin carried
by
two mitred bishops and two clerks.

Behind the chsse is a young man in a broad-skirted
garment holding a flowering branch in the left hand (Fig. 143).
Overcome
by the excessive heat generated by the miracle he has thrown off his
coat
which he carries on a stick over his right shoulder. And on his head
(a
most important detail, as we shall see) he wears a crown of greenery.
Behind
him and over his head sprout luxuriant leaves.

The archivolts of the Saint Firmin portal are made up of
three orders of angels.

In the jambs of the portal are arranged twelve local saints,
accompanied by a couple of angels (Figs. 127 and 128). Georges
Durand identified
the right hand figures (from inside to outside) as Firmin the
Confessor,
Domice, Salve, Fuscien, Warlus and Luxor, and on the left
Honor, an
angel, Ache, Acheul, another angel and Ulphe. [45]

To identify each of the column figures by name is less important
than to recognize the general principle of formal comparison between
the
legendary pillars of the local church whose relics were contained in
the
great chsses on the relic altar and the company of the
Apostles
in the central portal. That saints in their lives re-create the life of
Christ is indicated by means of the formal sameness that relates
these images
to the Beau Dieu of the central trumeau. [46]
However, there is a real interest in the stories gathered
around these legendary local saints. Saint Ulphe, on the extreme left
of
the left portal, attracts our interest partly through her formal
characterstics
as an aberrant (Fig. 127). [47]
Her face idealized, with almond-shaped eyes, and her slender
curved body swathed in finely-chiselled drapery, crinkled in the
hooked
folds of the "antique revival" Ulphe seems isolated
amongst the
substantial and solidly planted figures with their drapery falling in
broadly-cut
vertical folds.

Ulphe was said to have been born in the Soissonais in the
late seventh century. Her life followed the pattern of many a
Christian
virgin. Devoted to the church, she declined several offers of marriage,
insisting on no spouse other than Jesus Christ himself. When her
parents
attempted to impose a secular life upon her she simulated madness,
running
half-clad through the streets, her hair and clothes in disorder, her
face
soiled. Abandoning her father's house in Amiens she sought solitude
in the
wilderness, where she fell asleep by a spring. The Virgin appeared,
splendid
in light, holding the infant Jesus, who told her to establish a house
where
other religious women could follow her example. Passing by the
spring came
Domice, a former canon of Notre-Dame of Amiens who had given up
his prebend
(regular income) to live a solitary life. Warned of his approach in a
dream,
Ulphe rose and greeted him, asking to be adopted as his spiritual
daughter.
Meanwhile the bishop of Amiens also had a dream. Unhappy about
the lack
of young women taking vows of perpetual virginity, the bishop was
granted
a vision of a young woman who had come to him seeking to make
such a vow.
With appropriate celebration the bishop accepted Ulphe's vow,
entrusting
Domice with her protection. Ulphe died on January 31 and her
remains, at
first interred in her own oratory, were later transferred to the
cathedral.
Her cult was well-established by the thirteenth century-- Bishop
Arnoul
(d. 1247) left 60 sous for the celebration of her anniversary.
[48]

Ulphe's aberrant status, expressed in the clear formal differences
outlined above, allows for an intriguing double reading. The
twentieth-century
beholder might want to find here a commentary upon the
construction of gender
difference and the status of women. However, what we now read as
"aberration"
may, paradoxically, have originally been intended to provide a
prototype.
In her stance and attributes, Ulphe is very similar to the Virgin of
the
Annunciation in the south portal (Fig. 124). [49] This statue may
actually
have been carved as the Virgin Mary, only to be put aside and later
employed
as a type of Virgin.

Ulphe's companion on her left is an angel, and beyond that
are two cephalophores --decapitated figures who now carry
their own
heads (Fig. 127).
These figures have usually been identified as the little-known
local saints Ache and Acheul, who were buried at Abladne
close to
the tomb of Saint Firmin the martyr--a spot commemorated through
the construction
of the church later known as Notre-Dame des Martyrs and Saint-
Acheul. [50]
Although the names of these saints are commemorated in thirteenth-
century
litanies, they are not associated with any specific thaumaturgical
attributes.
This identification is to understood in relation to the presence of
relics
of these saints on the relic altar. The identity of the two decapitated
figures vibrates with that of two much better-known members of the
local
hierarchy--also cephalophores--John Baptist and Firmin
Martyr.

Next in the series of column figures on the left side of
the portal comes an angel with an incense burner and lastly a
bearded figure
in the garb of a bishop holding a chalice generally identified as
Honor,
seventh bishop of Amiens (died c. 600). [51]
Honor is said to have resisted his vocation as bishop.
His reluctance was overcome by a miraculous consecration resulting
from
an effusion of holy oil from heaven. Many more miracles followed,
some of
which we will find depicted in the tympanum of the portal of the
south transept.
The most important event that secured the preeminence of this
bishop amongst
the saints of the diocese was the discovery of the relics of the
martyred
saints Fuscien, Victoric and Gentien. King Childebert himself had
allegedly
attempted to take possession of these relics, but he was prevented
from
removing them. The king subsequently made generous gifts to
endow the cult
of the three saints and sent goldsmiths to Amiens to make a silver
chsse.
Honor is said to have been buried at Port, the place of his
birth.
In the ninth century Bishop Hilmerade had the remains of his body
brought
to Amiens because of the danger from the invading Danes. In 1060 at
a time
of great drought Bishop Guy ordered a procession to carry the relics
around
the walls of the city. A paralytic, unable to follow the procession, was
healed at the spot of the oratory of Saint Martin; the drought was
relieved
and other miracles ocurred. In another procession, as the
chsse
passed the church of Saint Firmin the Confessor, the figure of
Christ
on the crucifix of the jub inclined his head. In 1240 a great
quest
was undertaken in which the chsse was taken out into
the diocese
in order to raise funds for constructing the cathedral (Appendix A,
item
15).

The innermost figure of the sequence on the right side of
the portal is also a bishop (Fig. 128). It has been assumed that this is
Firmin the Confessor, a little-known personage, said to have been the
son
of Faustinien, the Roman senator converted by the Martyr. [52]
He was patron of the parish and collegiate church that existed
to the north-west of the cathedral. After a stay in Rome he returned
to
rebuild the churches destroyed by Attila. Returning to Amiens, he
erected
a church on the site of Saint Firmin's tomb at Abladne. Among
the
miracles associated with Saint Firmin was the vision of Christ's hand
marked
with the sign of the cross that appeared to the bishop as he was
celebrating
the Eucharist. He was buried in the church that he had erected at
Abladne.

Next to Firmin is a deacon generally identified as Domice,
the spiritual guide and protector of the saintly virgin Ulphe. Given
the
proximity and distance that characterized their lives, it seems
appropriate
to find them in the same portal, yet not side-by-side. In this figure
the
sculptor has succeeded in breaking away from the too-well
established Amiens
type, carving a figure that is full of humanity

The next figure in the sequence on the right side of the
portal is a bishop generally identified as Saint Salve (Sauve) who
succeeded
Honor and who died in 615 (Fig. 128). [53]
Born of a wealthy family of Amiens he gave up his wealth
in order to construct a monastery at Montreuil-sur-Mer, of which he
became
the first abbot. It has been claimed that at the time he became
bishop (c.
600) his seat was in the church of Notre-Dame des Martyrs, the site
of the
burial of the sainted evangelists of the diocese. The story of the
invention
of the relics has already been told. In the spirit of local tradition, it
is to this bishop that we owe the existence of the cathedral in the city
of Amiens.

After Salve come three male figures, who are normally identified
as saints Fuscien, Warlus and Luxor. [54]
About Warlus and Luxor we know nothing, and it is much more
likely that Fuscien is accompanied by his companions, Victoric and
Gentien.
Fuscien and Victoric were said to be part of a group of evangelists
who
came from Rome in the third century. Endangered as a result of the
persecutions
of Rictiovarius, Fuscien and Victoric were sheltered by Gentien, a
native
of the area. All three were executed. The place of their burial was
revealed
in the sixth century to a priest of Amiens, Lupicin, whose joyful
singing
came to the ears of Bishop Honor. The relics were
subsequently brought
into the city of Amiens. In the column figures one of the three is
depicted
with a sword in reference to the manner of his execution. The other
two
bear scrolls--they actually look more like prophets than local
martyrs.
[55]

Below the column figures the signs of the zodiac and images
from the labors of the months convey the cyclical nature of life. The
year
begins to the right of the portal with double-headed Janus and
proceeds
to the outer edge of the embrasure, then returning from outer to
inner on
the matching embrasure on the left. It is within the revolving
sequence
of the year that the saints are remembered, each on their
appropriate feast
day.

The designers of the portal have thus created a palpable
structure to convey to the visitor the idea of the church as it existed
at Amiens: founded through the agency of saints and martyrs and
legitimized
through the physical presence of their remains and through miracles.
The
portal might be compared with the precious books, the martyrologies
and
necrologies, that preserved the memory of the local saints within the
cyclical
framework of the Christian year. But placed within the overall
framework
of the west faade the portal can achieve more than any book.
The beholder
is given vital clues and incentives to match the local and the
particular
with the universal--thus, the triumphal entry of the relics of Saint
Firmin
into the city of Amiens becomes the Triumphal Entry of Christ into
Jerusalem,
with fronds thrown on to the road and the cry of
"Hosanna!" [56]
The column figures are the re-created bodies of the saints
whose relics were placed on the relic altar of the cathedral providing
a
preliminary experience of the sacred objects in the spaces yet to be
entered.

The events of the invention and translation of the relics
of Saint Firmin were re-created by the clergy as a means of forming
a kind
of consensus: a unity of intention that embraced all types and ages of
men
and women: in other words all the city population who were the
hommes
de Saint Firmin.

The Prophets [57]

Each of the portals has been entered and considered as a
separate unit. The designer of the faade has, however, taken
care
to link the three portals with a unifying screen of human figures
attached
to the front surfaces of the four great buttresses. These are the
twelve
minor prophets. The four major prophets are set against the
buttresses of
the main portal, continuing the lines of the Apostles. The prophets
constitute
a kind of avant-garde, forcing the visitor to withdraw a little way
back
from the faade, and to begin to consider the integrity of the
program
as a whole (Fig. 111).

Prophets are voyants --they have the power to see
and to speak of the future. [58]
It is intriguing to consider the implications of the word,
praedicere, to "say beforehand," since the same
stem lies
behind "prdicateur," a preacher. The prophets
were preachers,
just as the Apostles who followed them. Commentators on the
meaning of the
church saw the towers as preachers--it thus seems appropriate to
find prophets
placed upon the great buttresses that ascend to form the corners of
the
west towers. [59]

Prophets are agents provocateurs with the power to
criticize kings as well as the people at large. They destabilize society.
Their job was to reveal the ultimate pattern of things that was at risk
of being forgotten, and to underline the pertinence of this pattern as
far
as problems in the current order were concerned, revealing a future
hidden
in the mystery of God. The encounter with the twelve minor
prophets at Amiens,
all of whom look somewhat similar one to another, indicates the
presence
of an intellectual system --one that has the power to bind together
the
three portals. We encounter here a caste of people, a privileged
group,
who anticipated the priesthood of the Church. The anticipation
inherent
in prophecy interacts with the beholder's forward motion as he or
she moves
from the realm of the old law to that of the new, and into sacred
space.
The forward pull established by this avant-garde justifies our
earlier
treatment (Chapter Three) of the interior spaces in terms of
movement .

The overall impact of the prophets is simple and powerful,
and the beholder is encouraged to continue the search for a more
specific
structure behind their placement. The sequence runs from right-to-
left with
Hosea, Joel and Amos on the extreme right buttress, Obadaiah, Jonah
and
Micah to the right of the central portal, Nahum, Habakkuk and
Zephanaiah
to the left and Haggai, Zecharaiah and Malachi to the extreme left.
[60]
Each prophet carries a scroll and stands above quatrefoil
images that project elements of his vision, reminding us that God
communicated
with the prophets both in words and in images. The quatrefoil
images are
like learned footnotes pointing to a background in the Paris schools
and
the study of Saint Jerome's commentaries on the
prophets.[61]

Commentators on the prophets have searched for a structure
of some kind behind rambling and repetitious writings that veer
from songs
of elation to visions of destruction. The message conveyed by the
prophets
related, above all, to the theme of the Israelites as the elect--God's
people,
chosen, yet chronically prone to sin, and in need of constant threats
of
punishment and warnings of a final judgement. Within the system
devised
by the designers of the Amiens program the idea of the elect is
transferred
from the Israelites to the Catholic Church. A recent study of the
minor
prophets emphasizes the unity of the first six of them in their
interest
in the cosmic implications of the covenant made between God and
the sinning
Israelites. [62]
We have seen that this idea of a covenant is developed in
the lintels of the south portal, where the Ark of the Covenant is
flanked
by the priests of the old order. The designers of the sculptural
program
obviously wanted to project the idea of the Church as the result of a
new
covenant between God and the elect of his Church. The acceptance of
Gentiles
into the elect; the possibility of forgiveness from sin and the essential
inclusiveness of the Church are conveyed in the quatrefoil images on
the
far right buttress of Hosea's wedding to a prostitute (symbolizing the
acceptance
of the Gentiles).

The next three prophets, Nahum, Habakkuk and Zephanaiah may
be understood in terms of their concern with the punishment that
will be
meted out to sinners. They are well-placed on the buttress that
flanks the
portal of the Last Judgement. While dealing with the same themes as
the
others, the last three prophets, Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi open
the
possibilities of restoration.

Adolph Katzenellenbogen in his search for structure in the
quatrefoil images observed that the prophecies chosen for the two
right
buttresses illustrate the conditions for salvation and the
foreshadowing
of God's grace, whereas gloomier themes are conveyed in the
quatrefoils
of the prophets on the two left buttresses. [63]
Thus, the essentially optimistic message derived from the
acceptance of the harlot on the extreme right buttress may be
balanced by
the punishment of the unworthy priests in the quatrefoil under
Malachi,
who occupies the corresponding position on the extreme left hand
buttress.
Whereas on the right side the cities of Nineveh and Zion are shown in
a
positive light, on the left the city receives a very different kind of
treatment.
Unforgettable is the image of the Lord with his lantern searching
Jerusalem--for
none shall escape his scrutiny (Zephanaiah). Nineveh is shown lain
waste.
A malediction is placed upon the city with its shining sword and
glittering
spear (Nahum) while Haggai grimly views the fallen temple. It is
intriguing
to find these negative urban and architectural vignettes flanking the
left
portal. For this is the portal dedicated to Saint Firmin, the protector
of the townsfolk of Amiens and probably their principal means of
entrance
to the cathedral. [64]
These images flanking the portal of Saint Firmin serve to
remind us that the City of God and the material city are ultimately
irreconcilable.

The four major prophets stand with their backs to the buttresses
flanking the central portal: they thus link the screen of minor
prophets
with the lines of Apostles. Isaiah and Jeremaiah stand on Christ's left
(our right) and Ezechiel and Daniel opposite (Figs. 130 and 131). The
transition
from the age of prophecy to the age of grace is marked by a break in
the
well-established regularity in the rows of figures on each side. Isaiah
assumes a contrapposto stance (the only figure in the central
portal
to do so ( Fig. 131). His drapery falls in the crinkled hook-folds of the
"antique revival". His face with almond-shaped staring
eyes and
wavy hair shaped with geometric regularity is quite different from
the faces
of his companions to either side. This visual differencing serves to
announce
a separation between the ranks of Apostles and Prophets. It is also
possible
that Isaiah was carved early in the sequence of work on the column
figures
(like Sainte Ulphe in the north portal) and that the figure embodies a
style
that was rejected as the work progressed. It seems that a deliberate
attempt
was made to match this unusual figure on the other side in the figure
of
Ezechiel, who is also aberrant (Fig. 130). His short and stocky body is
enveloped in an oversized robe that breaks into complex folds as it
cascades
to the ground. Unlike his companions, he wears a cowl that allows a
short
fringe of hair to escape on to his forehead. The two outer prophets
resemble
the Apostles: next to Ezechiel, Daniel is clad in the same kind of
drapery
as his New Testament colleagues, although he is considerably thinner.
Daniel's
head was replaced in the restorations of the nineteenth century.
Jeremaiah,
next to Isaiah, who carries a cross (perhaps a nineteenth-century
restoration)
could be taken for an Apostle.

Whereas the extraordinary forms assumed by Isaiah and Ezechiel
might be read as expressive of the rupture between Old and New
Testaments,
the images in the quatrefoils below emphasize their unity and
interaction.
Thus, the interlocked wheels under Ezechiel and the two seraphims
under
Isaiah refer to the relationship between the two Testaments. In the
lower
quatrefoils the Old Order is put straight by the New (Christ with his
plumb-line
correcting Jerusalem under Ezechiel) and Isaiah with his lips purged
by
a hot coal held in tongs, the two parts of which also symbolize the
two
Testaments.

Unifying Themes

The prophets have forced us back and away from the portals
to the far side of the cathedral square, the parvis (considerably
less extensive in the Middle Ages than now), and have provided an
incentive
for the search for the underlying formal and thematic integrity of the
program
as a whole (Fig. 111).

Up close, overwhelmed by the surfeit of imagery (especially
in its present blackened and besmirched state), the modern beholder,
averting
the eyes, may simply pass by. There is simply too much to deal with
here!
We are thus brought back to the problem of intelligibility with
which
we opened this chapter. Is it possible to make sense of the totality in
terms of something greater than the sum of its too many parts?

At a short distance the church is quite literally seen to
be built upon the company of the prophets, the saints and the
apostles.
The column figures, despite slight formal differences, bear a high
degree
of physical resemblance one to another--an expression of the
corporate identity
of the elect, unified as the ideal community of the Church. The
general
appearance of the line of long-robed column figures at Amiens
recalls the
images of the elect in the mosaics in Italo-Byzantine churches--one
thinks,
for example, of the sameness of the long-robed martyrs and virgins
who line
the nave of Sant'Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna. [65]
The same prototype is recalled by the drapery and stance
of the Amiens figures, with their deliberate avoidance of the
rhythmic interactions
inherent in the contrapposto stance. Willibald Sauerlnder
found in
the rigid columnar appearance of the Amiens column figures a
dependence
upon Middle Byzantine ivories (see Chapter Seven, above). [66]
I would want to underline this connection, speculating upon
a relationship with Italo-Byzantine monumental mosaic and painted
programs,
and a vital interaction between the form of the Amiens figures
and
their intended meaning. Bishop Evrard de Fouilloy had been a
participant
in the Fourth Lateran Council in Rome that marked a decisive step
forward
in centralized papal control over the Church. [67]
The deliberate rejection of the subtle curves and crinkled
broken drapery of the first Antique Revival figures carved at Amiens
(Sainte
Ulphe; Isaiah) in favor of columnar rigidity provides a palpable
indication
of this Italocentrism.

In the shimmering light-reflective images set high on the
walls, triumphal arch or apse of an Italo-Byzantine church human
beings
are depicted in their perfect post-resurrection state. [68]
At Amiens, however, an extensive eschatological program has
been adapted to the three-dimensional medium of monumental
portal sculpture,
and the figures of the elect placed a level where they are very
accessible
to the beholder--almost within range of the touch. The company of
the elect
gains additional meaning through its corporeality and its rigorous
coordination
with the architectural matrix. The beholder is invited, in a sense, to
participate.
Thus, Saint Paul in Ephesians, 2, 19-22, "Now therefore ye are
no more
strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of
the
household of God. And are built upon the foundation of the apostles
and
prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; in whom
all
the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in
the Lord:
in whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God
through the
Spirit." Similarly, in I Peter, 2, 4-5, "To whom coming, as
unto
a living stone, disallowed, indeed, of men, but chosen of God and
precious.
Ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy
priesthood...."
Particularly powerful in the context of the Gothic portal is the
allegorical
significance of the elect as columns in the new Jerusalem. See, for
example,
Revelation 3, 12, "Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in
the
temple of my God, and he shall go no more out; and I will write upon
him
the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is
the new
Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God..."
And Paul,
in Galatians 2, 9, refered to the Apostles as pillars. These texts found
many echoes in the biblical exegesis of the Middle Ages. [69]
And of course, Abbot Suger of Saint-Denis (De Consecratione
) referred to the twelve supporting columns of the ambulatory of
his
abbey church as the Apostles. [70]

The human figures depicted in the portals thus gain specific
levels of meaning through their relationship to the architectural
frame.
The emphatic straightness of the column figures is enhanced through
contrast
with the crouching console figures that support them. Medieval
theologians
repeatedly returned to the theme that while man's soul is created in
the
image of God, in his body he is a microcosm of the carnal world.
However,
the potential of man to transcend the animals is signaled by the fact
that
he walks upright --this is a sign of potential redemption. [71]
These are thus changed figures--humans who have rejected
their own carnality.

The architectural frame lends other levels of meaning: the
heavenly orders, for example, find their place in the overarching
voussoirs.
The very apertures of the doors themselves are significant. If the
visitor
has missed the point that Christ is the door by which the faithful
enter
sacred space, the story of the wise and foolish virgins carried on the
door
jambs refers to the open and closed doors of the wedding feast. [72]
But there is an exciting hidden dimension in the metaphor
that may escape the attention of the casual visitor. Christ is not only
the door, he is also the Logos, the ordering principle that lies
behind the totality. [73]
This concept is rendered palpable in the very proportions
of the doorways at Amiens. In the relationship between its long and
short
sides the rectangular aperture of each portal embodies the perfection
of
the relationship of one to the square root of two--the same
proportion that
determines the nave plan and the elevation of the west faade.
[74]

With the image of Christ, the Beau Dieu, at the center
of an ideal community of apostles, prophets and saints, we have
come full
circle back to the point where we began--the three superimposed
images that
form such a clear axis for the entire program. The Beau Dieu
stands
at the center of a great three-dimensional cross-shaped pattern of
related
images. [75]
The vertical axis of this structure is provided by the three
Christological images themselves, including the Son of Man/Judge
and the
Apocalyptic Christ. This vertical axis is established by personal
identity
but not by formal similarity. In other words, although we know that
Christ
is depicted three times, the images do not look alike. [76]
Horizontal linkage, on the other hand, is established by
the overwhelming formal sameness that characterises the
relationship between
the Beau Dieu and the Apostles, prophets and saints in the
column
figures. Given the eschatological time framework of the central Last
Judgement,
the Apostles, prophets and saints might be seen as bodies in the
perfection
and permanence of their resurrected state at the Second Coming. [77]
Some of the Apostles carry the instruments of their martyrdom
or trample the person responsible for their execution. The
participation
of the elect in Christ, already apparent during life, will be perfected
only after resurrection. [78]
This is, then, nothing less than the community of the elect
participating in the Second Coming of Christ to his Heavenly
Jerusalem.
The citizens of the Church, which is the City of God, are signed or
stamped
with Christ's image. And the third dimension of the cross-shaped
matrix
results from the relation between the Son of Man in the lintel and
the eucharistic
sacrament on the high altar. The visitor in front of the portal is
invited
to embark along this long axis extends the length of the
cathedral

It would be a mistake, however, to limit the role of the
column figures to a distant eschatological realm. These are not, after
all,
the shimmering images high up in a Byzantine church. With the
details of
their faces (including the pupils of the eyes) emphatically painted
and
their near-human scale these figures must have looked very much
alive. There
was, moreover, a certain resemblance between the column figures
and the
beholder who might look upon the image as a kind of model or
paradigm. These
paradigms were intended to help the pious beholder rediscover the
image
of God placed in each human being and confirmed at baptism.

The understanding of the column figures and the Beau Dieu
of Amiens as living prototypes has recently received striking
confirmation
in Wilhelm Schlink's book, Der Beau Dieu von Amiens. [79]
Schlink finds an important dimension of the unifying power
of the Beau Dieu within the framework of Biblical exegesis.
Psalm
91 ("Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder") was an
exegetical
pivot between Old and New Testaments. Saint Augustine and other
Church Fathers
stressed the connection between the psalm and Matthew's account of
the Temptation
of Christ. The devil, tempting Christ to throw himself off a high
pinnacle
of the Temple, has the wit and cunning to quote the psalmist's words,
"for
it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in
their
hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot
against
a stone."

Christ's ability to triumph over the devil and resist temptation
provides the living model or template for those who would wish to
emulate
him and join the elect. Herein lies a most important dimension of the
similarity
between the Apostles and the central image. The Apostles are human
beings
who, thanks to the model provided by the living Christ, have
achieved perfection
even during their own lives. The visitor to the cathedral is invited to
do likewise, and is provided a map in the form of the quatrefoil
images
of the virtues and vices, and the door, Christ, through which to enter
as
well as the forma formatrix, the forming form that is the
Beau
Dieu. [80]

Thus, we have recognized the potential of the Apostles and
saints to serve both as projections of the elect of the Heavenly
City and living models demonstrating to the pious visitor that
the
battle with sin was one that could be won. The idea of predestination
is
inherent in the image of the living elect. [81]
The image of God is planted within each human being. The
essential objective of life is to find that image, which is nothing other
than the image of that very person himself or herself. Images tend
inexorably
toward their prototype. Each human, with this image imprinted on
the soul,
projects him/herself forward toward God, just as the sculptural
program
projects the Church toward the ultra-temporal New Jerusalem, the
City of
God, populated by the citizens of heaven.

The same interaction between the present and the ultra-temporal
is inherent in the Eucharistic sacrament. The Last Judgement of the
central
tympanum brings Christ to the New Jerusalem at the end of time (a
second
Triumphal Entry). This Second Coming was linked to the arrival of
Christ
in the sacrament of the Eucharist and resurrection--"Whoso
eateth my
flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life, and I will raise him up
at
the last day" (John, 6, 54). Thus, the Second Coming of Christ,
the
Last Judgement, is anticipated in his arrival to the community of his
assembled
people as they celebrate the Lord's Supper. [82]

The idea of arrival, adventus, is developed further
in the two side portals of the west faade.[83]
To the right of the north portal of the Mre de Dieu
the angel arrives to announce to Mary the imminent birth of
Christ;
Elizabeth to confirm his conception; Mary to present the infant to
Simeon.
In the tympanum of the same portal the Virgin arrives to a
triumphant reception
at the side of her son. And in the left jamb of the portal the three
Magi
arrive to present their gifts across the space of the portal to the
infant
Jesus in the trumeau.

The adventus of the Three Magi, celebrated at Epiphany
(January 6) interacts with translation of the relics of Saint Firmin
depicted
in the north portal since the two different arrivals were celebrated at
Amiens within the framework of the liturgical year in a double feast
(January
6-13) when a multi-sensory re-enactment of the miracle of the
invention
and translation of the relics was undertaken.

The miraculous appearance of leaves and flowers in the dead
of winter was personified through the appearance of a Green Man
(l'Homme
Vert ) at cathedral vespers. [84]
In the liturgy the role of the Green Man was played by the
beadle from the church of Saint-Firmin-en-Chtillon, clad in
green,
and wearing a foliate crown. The day before the feast of the
invention of
the relics of Saint Firmin (January 12) the same Green Man would
appear
carrying foliate crowns for each member of the clergy. At a point in
the
service after the response, Cum Aperiretur, incense was
thrown upon
burning embers to recreate the perfume that had emanated from the
newly
discovered relics. At the blessing of the incense the celebrants
changed
into summer robes to signify their reaction to the miraculous winter
warmth.
During the Magnificat the Green Man presented a foliate crown
to
each of the canons and chaplains. The Green Man might also appear
on occasions
of great festive significance, such as the visit of the king to the
cathedral.

Several kinds of reference can be found to the agency of the Green
Man in
the stones of the cathedral. He can be recognized as the young man
with
the foliate crown following the chsse of Saint Firmin in
the
tympanum of the north portal (Figs. 129 and 143)). And the interior
space
of the cathedral itself is girded with a rich band of foliage (at the
level
of the triforium sill) that forms an undying reference to the miracle
of
the foliage and flowers (Fig. 14).

The Green Man was clearly a phenomenon rooted in the distant
pre-Christian past. His arrival coincided with the popular time for
marriage
in Amiens--known as Saint Firmin l'Amoureux. His cyclical
appearance
should be understood as one of many such practices that bridged the
potential
gap between "high" and "low" religion in the
Middle
Ages. [85]

A similar bridge between the complexities of Biblical exegesis
and the popular understanding of Christian truths was provided by
sermons.
[86]
The modern beholder who attempts to come to grips with the
meaning of the cathedral in the eyes and minds of contemporary
(thirteenth-century)
people and the multiplicity of potential responses can refer to a
written
source of great value: the text of a sermon preached in Amiens
Cathedral
in the second half of the thirteenth century. [87]
Whereas the sophistication of the sculptural program of the
western frontispiece with its prophets and quatrefoil imagery like
learned
footnotes probably originated in the Paris Schools, the unidentified
preacher
spoke a vernacular language aimed directly at the popular audience.

The overall theme of the rambling sermon is obedience--a
theme that is also of relevance as far as the architectural program is
concerned.
The preacher tells his audience that obedience is expected, above all,
in
keeping the feast days and sacraments and respect for the bishop
who is
a type of Christ, standing "in the place of our Lord on
earth."
This typological link is expressed visually in the trumeau figures of
Christ
and Saint Firmin as well as in the episcopal tombs that were
originally
placed on the axis of the church directly inside the central portal. In
those tombs the images of the bishops are cast, in a sense, in the
same
mold as the Beau Dieu (Figs.133 and 134).In the
images
of virtues and vices in the quatrefoils of the central portal
disobedience
is portrayed as a young man insulting a bishop.

Our preacher has no difficulty in locating the origin of
disobedience in the Original Sin of Adam and Eve (depicted at the
base of
the trumeau of the right portal), who, he says, spent five hundred
and fourteen
years in death and in hell because of their disobedience--may God
through
his mercy save us from the same fate! Disobedience leads to
judgement: "'Sinners,'
says Jesus Christ, 'there, where I find you, there, I shall judge
you!'"
[88]
Those found in a state of unrepentance and without the grace
of confession are sentenced to death and the torments of hell. The
words
of the preacher find their immediate expression in the theme of the
tympanum
of the central portal.

What is the sinner to do under these unpropitious circumstances?
The preacher proposes three possibilities. The first one lies in good
works--
through the actions of the repentant sinner who follows the teaching
of
the Apostles; who seeks again to love his neighbor; who undertakes a
penitential
pilgrimage; who keeps the feasts; who comes to church. Just for
leaving
your home and coming to church without paying a penny, you can
gain forty
days of remission! As far as the actions of the penitant are
concerned,
the preacher stresses repeatedly that it is not the beginning of life
that
matters, but the end. Judas Iscariot had a good start, but a bad
ending;
Mary Magdalene, conversely, ended well after a bad start. It was, the
preacher
tells us, through repentance and through the worthy end of her life
that
the Magdalene was crowned in paradise with the Apostles. The good
works
prescribed by the preacher correspond with the signs clearly
established
in the virtues and vices in the quatrefoils of the central portal. It is
by following these signs that penitants are able to cast themselves in
the
same mold as the Apostles and saints of the portals.

In addition to good works (stressed in the central portal),
penitants have two powerful agencies working on their behalf. First,
the
Virgin Mary, the patron of the cathedral itself. "The sweet
mother
of God, Saint Mary of Amiens, she is your lady over all ladies. She is
the
the lady of the world, the queen of the glorious heavens. She is the
treasure
of sinners; she is the saviour of souls, she is the spouse of Our Lord;
she is the mother of Jesus Christ; she is the temple of the Holy Spirit.
This lady recovers those who are lost; she lifts up those who have
fallen:
this lady is the help of captives. She comforts the sad, she helps the
weak;
she prays for the people, she sustains the timid; she defends women.
Know
that evil entered into the world by woman and is eradicated by
woman."
[89]
Mary is thus able to rectify the reproach that had resulted
from the action of Eve (refer to the image of Eve at the foot of the
trumeau
of the right portal). The image of Mary as the Temple is conveyed by
the
Ark of the Covenant placed inside Ecclesia, directly above the
Virgin's
head, and Mary as the spouse of Christ is in the tympanum. The
preacher
illustrates Mary's power to pardon even the greatest sins by means
of the
story of Theophilus, who had sold his soul to the devil but who was
redeemed
through his own penitance and confession, and through the
intervention of
the Virgin Mary: "Good and sweet man, the mother of God,
Saint Mary
of Amiens truly brings you eternal pardon." [90]

The third possibility for the redemption of sinners resulted
from Christ's presence on earth and the conversion of Saints Peter
and Andrew
and the others who became fishers of men. The preacher names
other saints
and their martyrdom: Bartholomew, Laurence, Hippolytus, Catherine,
Margaret
and Agnes, as well as (later) Augustine, Bartholemew, Catherine (a
second
time), John Evangelist and Agatha. No mention is made of the local
saints
of Amiens featured on the left portal. The preacher explores the
Church
as it was established on earth through Christ's calling of the Apostles
and his ministry accompanied by miraculous healings. This earthly
Church
was established under the leadership of Peter who holds the keys to
Paradise.
Peter's authority is embodied in the Church with its hierarchy of
archbishops,
bishops and parish priests. It is through this church, with its
sacraments,
that the faithful are empowered to overcome the devil. It is in this
context
that the preacher makes a specific reference to the construction of
the
cathedral of Amiens. "Be sure that the devil, the enemy of our
souls,
was never as tormented as on that day and at the very hour that the
first
squared stone of this church was laid and the first child was baptised
and
regenerated in its holy font, and the first offices and the first
sacraments
of Jesus Christ were celebrated--as God be in my soul! And do you
know why
he was so tormented? May God pardon me! Because of the high
pardons and
the high prayers that are afforded you, good Christians...."
[91]

The redeeming power of Mary and of the established Church
are one and the same: "Good and sweet man, all of you together
and
each one of you who want to recognize the Mother of God, Saint Mary
of Amiens,
who is your mother Church the source of good, the source of unction,
chrism,
baptism, burial, betrothal, marriage and the sacred sacraments made
in the
holy church. The lord the bishop of Amiens who is our spiritual
father is
bound to bring you and lead you to Paradise in the blessed company
of the
angels, archangels, martyrs, confessors and blessed virgins who have
won
their term in Paradise through the martyrdom of their bodies and
the shedding
of their blood." [92]
This company of the blessed is none other than the column
figures of the left portal with Saint Firmin on the trumeau. And the
designer
of the portal has taken care to emphasize formal links to express the
concordance
of the two lateral portals.

It would, of course, be a mistake to represent the sermon
purely as a parallel to the sculptural program of the western
frontispiece.
A sermon unfolds within a linear structure; the various elements of
the
sculptural program, on the other hand, were available to the pious
visitor
as objects of prolonged and ritual devotion. The beholder of the
sculpture
plays a much more active role in the construction of truth than does
the
aiudience of the sermon. Yet the preacher's rambling and repetitious
treatment
of the three great avenues of salvation outlined above--through good
works;
through the agency of the Virgin Mary; through the agency of the
established
Church--allows the listener to return and reconsider the well-
established
themes that do, in fact, correspond with the three portals of the
cathedral.
And there is clearly a central concern--disobedience; sin; purgatory;
potential
damnation; the means of redemption. The sermon is incomplete and
we are
unfortunately deprived of the conclusion. As far as the surviving
portion
indicates the preacher begins with the fear of Last Judgement and
ends with
an intense contemplation of the corporeality of Christ and the reality
of
his sufferings. [93]
This strategy resembles our own visit to the sculptural program,
which began and ended at the central portal.

The sermon thus provides hints about the way in which the
complex message of the sculptural program might have been
propagated to
the people of Amiens. Although certain levels of meaning inherent in
the
exegetical framework of the sculptural program would have to be
decoded
rather than "read" (more on this later), a single root
image is
propagated in both the learned and the popular vehicle. The
interaction
between the words of Psalm 91 and the story of the temptation of
Christ
indicates that at the center of the cathedral lies the victory of Christ
over the devil. And this is exactly what the preacher tells his
audience--that
the devil was never so tormented as on the day when the first
squared stone
of the cathedral was laid.

Thus, it might be concluded that the redemptive significance
of the sculptural program of the west faade was not lost upon
an audience
familiar with sermons like the one examined above. However, we
must allow
for the possibility of multiple responses recognising that certain
elements
of the program might exert particular power over certain individuals
or
groups. The written sources allow us to document an instance where
an element
of sculpture became an icon attracting the devotion of the townsfolk.
In
1549 Martin Bucer and Paul Fagius from Strasbourg passed through
Amiens
on their way to England. [94]
They mention a devotional practice that is documented in
several other local sources. At dusk the artisans and workers of the
city
would gather at the portal to kneel before the statue of the Virgin
Mary
(south portal of the west faade). To add greater intensity to
the
ritual experience and to animate the image a lamp would be hoisted
up to
illuminate the face of the Virgin. Thus, what we would see as an
integral
part of a a rigorous encyclopaedic program might be, in a sense,
detached
from the whole in order to serve as an icon, the object of intense
personal
devotion.

In one important respect the efficacy of the sculpural program
should be questioned. Despite the best efforts of the clergy to
propagate
the cult of local saints the written evidence suggests that individuals
like Saint Victoric or Saint Gentien aroused little popular interest in
the late Middle Ages. [95]
Lists of devotional objects in local sixteenth-century inventories
do not include statuettes of (for example) Sainte Ulphe or Saint Ache
amongst
the possessions of the bourgeois of Amiens. [96]
On the other hand, the power of the cult of Firmin or John
Baptist is attested by the great popularity of these Christian names
amongst
the local population in the Middle Ages.

The promotion of the cult of the local saint was, no doubt,
to some extent a self-conscious phenomenon intended to unite the
local population
around the great construction project. In the difficult middle decades
of
the thirteenth century, at a time of financial exigency, the clergy
again
appealed to the popularity of a powerful local bishop-saint--this time
it
was Saint Honor.

The Portal of Saint Honor: an Affirmation of the
Local Bishop Saint [97]

This sculpture of the south transept faade portal has
always been difficult to understand within the general sequence of
work
at Amiens. Particularly problematic is the sharp difference between
the
stolid column figures with their heavy vertical drapery folds and
puppet-like
neckless heads and the lively and expressive figures in the voussoirs
and
tympanum that seem to belong to the stylistic ambiance of the mid-
century
(Fig. 118). It was demonstrated in Chapter Seven that the lower parts
of
the embrasures of this portal were begun with the earliest work at
Amiens,
in the early 1220s, and before the western frontispiece. However, the
construction
of the south transept faade was again taken in hand only
when work
had reached the upper nave in the mid 1230s. It was then decided to
thicken
the wall in the central segment of the south transept faade.
The austere
north transept portal which provided the main entrance toward the
bishop's
palace stands in sharp contrast to the lavish decoration of the south
portal
(Fig. 119). The south portal was probably originally intended to have
resembled
its counterpart to the north. Its elaboration clearly responded to its
public
location, giving on to a major thoroughfare, as well as the area of the
canons' houses.

The eight column figures of the south transept portal were
probably left-overs from a rejected scheme for the saints' portal of
the
west faade (Fig. 118). The innermost figure on each side is an
angel
carrying an incense burner: the drapery of the figure to the left of
the
portal is crinkled in the "antique" style. The other figures
are
generic ecclesiastical types: three hold books, two hold scrolls and
one
a chalice. Deeply chiselled vertical folds groove their drapery. The
faces
have a dispiriting monotony. Those on the left are neckless and look
as
if they have been somehow inflated. The work has a certain rough
and unfinished
appearance. But we may be dealing with an ideal facial type of the
period
that the modern beholder simply cannot appreciate. We have already
seen
such faces in the angels of the voussoirs of the Saint Firmin portal. On
the right embrasure of the portal of Saint Honor the angel has
the
same kind of bloated face, while the other three figures look
somewhat more
human. The architectural canopies and bases look maladroit (like
those of
the Saint Firmin portal) and the corbels under the bases carry a
range of
figures including a broad-faced squatting black man, wrestlers, a
spreadeagled
man who carries the console on his back, birds, a blacksmith, a man
and
his dog, a devil with a (restored) baby devil in his lap and a
crouching
figure. These robust little figures, picking up popular themes and
interests,
provide some relief in the ensemble.

The voussoirs of the south transept portal, which I have
dated around 1240, form an encyclopaedic structure of sacred
history from
Adam to the Apostolic era. Katzenellenbogen has perceived a
complex system
of balanced figures that is similar, in some ways, to the structure of
the
minor prophets of the west faade program. The four orders
include
angels, precursors from Adam to John Baptist, the major and minor
prophets
and finally the Apostles interspersed with holy women. Missing,
however,
is the central eschatological theme of the tympanum of the great
central
portal.

In the lowest horizontal lintel of the south portal twelve
figures are grouped in six pairs engaged in conversation, some
referring
to scrolls in their hands. These are probably the Apostles--the young
unbearded
John and the James the pilgrim are readily recognizable.

In the next horizontal register Honor, seated on the
far left, is consecrated bishop. His initial reluctance was overcome
through
a miraculous effusion of oil, seen on the left. His consecration was,
thus,
willy-nilly. To the right, three pairs of witnesses engage in animated
conversation.
This might provide the clue for the understanding of the twelve
figures
below. There, mysteries are are explored through reference to the
written
text, here, on the other hand, they are actually being witnessed. The
little
figure to the far right points across to the next miracle to be
witnessed
Here (to the right) the bishop is seen enthroned in a miniature
edifice
that signifies Ecclesia . The bishop's hand rests upon a book placed
upon
a lectern near the altar. The altar carries an enormous chalice and is
backed
with a low screen and cross. As he sits in his church he turns his
head
to listen to the song of praise from the priest, Lupicin, far away, as he
discovers the relics of the three sainted martyrs. As with the
invention
of Saint Firmin the full significance of the event is marked by the
blossoming
of trees.

In the third level, as Honor celebrates mass, the hand
of God blesses the sacrament. Once again, there are witnesses: the
three
clerics who stand behind the bishop. A blind woman is healed
through the
touch of the altar cloth where the statue of the saint stands. Behind
the
blind woman comes a lame man with his crutch and dog. The fourth
register
shows a procession with the reliquary of the sainted bishop led by
clergy
and choir boys. Some crippled men are healed as they touch the
shrine. And
once again, witnesses are present. Behind the chsse a
group
of people including women (one with a child) and Jews is engaged in
a lively
debate.

In the crown of the composition is an image of Christ on
the cross--unusual in Gothic sculpture of this period. [98]
The image of the Crucifixion may be understood in several
different ways. First, it is a depiction of the event. Christ is flanked
by Mary, John and censing angels. Second, this is an image of the
cross
placed on the jub of the church of Saint Firmin the Confessor
(also
known as Saints Peter and Paul) in the city of Amiens, a reference to
the
legend that the figure of Christ had bowed his head to the
chsse
of Saint Honor as it was carried by. And lastly, the
superimposition
of the Crucifixion directly over the chsse suggests
typological
links between the corpus of Christ and the remains of the body
of
Saint Honor.

Particularly interesting are the miraculous and thaumaturgical
events associated with the sacraments and the physical presence of
the reliquary
of the sainted bishop. Each scene is witnessed and discussed. The
imagery
might be linked with the debates of the 1240s on the proper role of
the
clergy. In 1246 in the context of one of the anti-clerical appeals to
the
Pope, the secular nobles attacked the arrogance of the clerks, who,
the
sons of serfs, had arrogated to themselves great powers and
jurisdictions.
The clerks were exhorted to return again to the state of the primitive
[Apostolic]
church, leaving the active life to the nobility. In this way miracles,
long
since unseen, would once again manifest themselves. [99]
Although Amiens was spared the violently anti-clerical uprisings
that took place at, for example, Beauvais, we saw in Chapter Five that
certain
incidents in the 1240s and 1250s do indicate that the city could not
entirely
have escaped the tensions generated by the fund-raising for the
crusade
and the crisis of morale that resulted from the failure of that
crusade.
In this situation the clergy at Amiens chose to feature the story of
their
sainted bishop, framed in the sequence of sacred history.

Another special event from this period should be linked with
the choice of this sequence of scenes in the tympanum. In 1240,
presumably
in response to a shortage of funds for the fabric, a quest was
organized
in which the reliquary of Saint Honor was carried through the
areas
around Amiens with an appeal for funds. In this context the
emphasis upon
the thaumaturgical powers of the relics of the saint placed in a major
thoroughfare
of the city was of obvious relevance. In the difficult middle decades
of
the thirteenth century the clergy was attempting to re-establish the
consensus
that had allowed work to start on the Gothic cathedral decades
earlier.
They saw the sainted local bishop, his relics and chsse
as
key instruments in this enterprise. [100]

It may have been intended to place an image of the bishop
in the central trumeau of the portal. However, presumably at the
instigation
of a member of the clergy or a lay benefactor and at a date in the
second
half of the thirteenth century, the portal received an image of much
greater
authority--the trumeau statue of the Virgin Mary. [101]
At about 2.25m meters in height the statue is a little smaller
that the column figures of the west facade. Moreover, the stance
assumed
by the Virgin could not be more unlike the stolid square-set Apostles
and
saints. The Virgin's right leg is free of any weight-bearing function,
yet
the upper body curves over this non-structural support. The child is
held
in the Virgin's left hand; the right hand (restored) is free. A bunch of
the Virgin's robe is held over the left wrist (under the child's behind)
allowing a chute drapery to fall downwards and pulling a fan of folds
from
the Virgin's right elbow. The converging lines created by these folds
fix
the beholder's attention upon the child, whose weight is counter-
balanced
by the Virgin's upper body. The two sides of the Virgin's body are
thus
very different--her right with a powerful succession of V-folds like
waves
and her left with column-like verticality. In direct contrast to the
Virgin
of the south portal of the west faade, there is a certain
sensuality
about the statue that John Ruskin found deeply disturbing. Originally
painted
blue, this statue, installed in the second half of the thirteenth
century,
was later gilded, and became known as the Golden Virgin, the
Vierge dore,
and the center of a local cult. Her presence confirms the
conclusion
already established from the study of the west faade
sculpture--that
despite the attempts of the clergy to construct a cult of local saints,
including Bishop Honor, it was, in the end, the powerful root
image
of the Virgin Mary that predominated.

Conclusion

The sculptural program of the portals of Amiens Cathedral
has been construed here within a framework of change. In
their material
state the stone statues and reliefs of the portals are caught up in the
same inexorable process of physical deformation or change that
affects our
own bodies: progressive decay that will ultimately lead to
disappearance.
The current program of conservation, begun in 1992, has drawn
attention
emphatically toward this accelerating process of decomposition. Yet,
paradoxically,
these stone figures were intended to be permanent, projecting
images of
changelessness. The column figures depict human beings who have
resisted
the corrosion of sin during life, in some cases triumphing over
martyrdom,
thus becoming the elect who look forward to the perfect state after
resurrection.
The paradox can be extended into the very process by which these
images
of perfection and changelessness were made. For it has been seen in
Chapter
Seven that this was a process in which change played a
considerable
initial role. Thus, the early work on the voussoir sculptures of the
south
portal of the west faade and the first column figures was
characterized
by experimentation and stylistic pluralism. The architecture of
Amiens Cathedral,
conversely, began with the exercise of powerfully centralized control
over
the means of production. This control is palpable in the repeated
("unchanging")
forms of the nave--identical piers, windows, vaults and flyers.
Whereas
the high level of uniformity in the architectural forms of the
cathedral
was broken by the revolution of the mid-1240s (upper transept and
upper
choir), in the sculpture initial pluralism was overlaid by the powerful
sameness of the column figures, particularly the Apostles and minor
prophets
(work of the 1230s and 1240s.) This emphatic sameness signifies the
participation
of the elect in the mystical body of Christ which is the Church,
providing
a glimpse of the perfection of the post-resurrection body.

It is hard to avoid the conclusion that the meaning of the
various elements of the sculptural program would, for the most part,
have
been readily available to most medieval beholders: the Last
Judgement; the
Apostles; the familiar chsse of Saint Firmin that was so
often
carried out into the community; the Virgin Mary. The Picard sermon,
aimed
at a popular audience, hinted at ways in which the themes of the
three portals
might be bound together into a single framework of redemptive
meaning. We
may surely agree with John Ruskin in understanding the sculpture as
a kind
of sermon in stone. This is not to say, however, that Marcel Proust
was
wrong, for there are certainly underlying levels of meaning--just like
the
underlying geometric matrix of the cathedral itself--that are not
immediately
apparent to the casual or uninformed visitor. The exegetical link
between
Psalm 91 and the Temptation of Christ inherent in the central
trumeau provides
an example of such encoded meaning. The idea of the Church
Triumphant, moreover,
is projected indirectly in the Coronation of the Virgin in the
south
portal. Behind this image lies an agenda, namely Church reform. The
presence
of the Ark of the Covenant in this portal is a particularly intriguing
sign
of this agenda since it provides a reference to the Lateran basilica
where
the remains of the Ark were preserved, and thus a reminder of the
reforming
Lateran Council of 1215, recently attended by the bishop of Amiens,
Evrard
de Fouilloy. [102]
Within the sculptural program there are also levels of meaning
that are propagated through the formal or stylistic choices that have
been
made. The idea of a reform-minded Church--one that embraced and
propagated
change--is conveyed by the very changelessness of human figures
that refer
back to the glorious mosaic images of Early Christian and Italo-
Byzantine
churches.

In assessing the problem of "decoding" these levels
of meaning, I would not use the metaphor of unintelligible
hieroglyphs,
as did Marcel Proust. Our failure to understand results not so much
from
inability to "read" the individual elements of the
program, but
involves rather the atrophy, over time, of the connecting tissue that
bound
together these images one to another, as well as to significant indices
in the outside world. Some of these lost tissues may be regained by
considering
(briefly) the putative objectives of the theologian whose ideas
probably
contributed to the program, namely the dean of the Amiens chapter,
Jean
Halgrin d'Abbeville. [103]

Jean Halgrin was born in the years around 1180 in Abbeville,
to the north of Amiens, and studied theology in Paris in a context
where
he would have become familiar with the ideas of Peter the Chanter
and Stephen
Langton. The future Pope Gregory IX was amongst his school-fellows.
Langton
was particularly important in d'Abbeville's formation given the
future archbishop
of Canterbury's role in what Beryl Smalley has called the
"Biblical
moral school," and his commentaries on the prophets. After
Paris, Jean
d'Abbeville spent some years in his native city before becoming
canon and
dean at Amiens Cathedral, an office that he held until 1225 when he
become
archbishop of Besanon. Having first been nominated as
patriarch of
Constantinople, d'Abbeville was called into papal service (by the new
pope,
Gregory IX) as cardinal-bishop of Sabina. On his death in 1237 the
Pope
sadly referred to d'Abbeville as "that illustrious column that
supported
with such glory the edifice of the Church." [104]
Given d'Abbeville's training in theology and his position
as the highest-ranking member of the Amiens chapter in the years
that the
sculptural program was being planned and begun, it is impossible to
escape
the conclusion that he may have been involved in some way in its
design.
[105]

To provide a complete outline of Jean d'Abbeville's ideas
and work would be quite impossible here, given the unedited state of
the
scattered manuscripts of his sermons and commentaries. Questions
remain
about the authorship of certain texts and considerable disagreement
in the
secondary sources about d'Abbeville's contributions and status as a
thinker
and preacher. The immediate passing of time was unkind to the
dean--a near-
contemporary,
Henri de Gand (Henry of Ghent), archdeacon of Tournai, remarked
that d'Abbeville's
sermon interpretation of the gospels was overlaid with excessive
verbiage
and the induction of too many citations from the scriptures--to the
point
that the overall structure was impossible to remember. [106]
One readily thinks of the quatrefoil images under the prophets
at Amiens as a rather heavy system of scholarly footnoting based
directly
upon the scriptures. Despite Katzenellenbogen's best efforts, the
general
structure of meaning behind the quatrefoil images of the prophecies
is still
not entirely clear. It is intriguing to find Proust's negative
judgement
about intelligibility anticipated in Henri de Gand's response.

Henri de Gand's negative reaction to d'Abbeville's literary
and rhetorical style did not, however, reflect the opinion of most of
his
contemporaries, since the dean was much sought after as a preacher.
[107]
His homilies were generally based upon a short literal explanation
of the scriptural text followed by a more extended interpretation of
the
moral application of the allegorized text to Christian life. His own
understanding
of what he was doing was entirely different from Henri de Gand's
unkind
characterization. D'Abbeville stressed in the prologue to his homilies
that
he wanted simply to address simple words to simple people, avoiding
the
highly worked prose that charms the ears of the more sophisticated
audience.
[108]
As one would expect from this former classmate of the future
Pope Gregory IX and likely student of Stephen Langton, d'Abbeville
was an
ardent partisan of change--Church reform. His sermons include
vehement attacks
on self-indulgent prelates, clerks and monks and upon vain-glory,
ambition,
avarice, simony, luxury, nepotism, harshness toward subordinates
and complaisance
toward the powerful. [109]
He was sympathetic toward the mendicants, working to facilitate
their establishment at Abbeville and Besanon--the
appearance of Francis
of Assissi at the head of the elect in the central tympanum is to be
understood
under these circumstances.

The modern reader of the dense Latin prose of the transcribed
sermons and commentaries may certainly understand the reaction of
Henri
de Gand, and yet at the same time may find something infinitely
memorable
about the dean's readings of the scriptures, since they are cast in
such
a way as to engage the audience in a very direct fashion. The
responses
and memories of our encounter with the cathedral are, in a sense,
legitimatized--certainly
rendered more profound--by d'Abbeville's readings. In the opening
passage
of his homily for Advent the preacher remarks that the four weeks
of Advent
reflect the four appearances of Christ: he comes as a human being; he
comes
in frightful majesty; he comes through his grace to illuminate our
minds,
and he comes knocking at our very doors. [110]
We saw earlier that the cathedral portals are about arrival,
adventus , and that at the axis of the system are multiple
images
of Christ. The preacher goes on to remark that the readings for the
first
week in Advent lie in the prophets, especially in Isaiah, since this
prophet
spoke of the mountains laid low and of the cleansing fire. It is
through
the fire of charity that human pride will be replaced by humility and
what
is cold, compact and hard through malice and obstinacy will melt in
penitance
at the appearance of the Lord. At Amiens, of course, the prophets on
the
front surfaces of the buttresses and flanking the main portal prepare
us
for the incarnation of the Man-God in the south and central portals.
The
shock of entry liquifies even the hardened visitor, preparing him or
her
to receive the extraordinary sequence of impressions that will be
stamped
or imprinted unforgettably upon the mind.

D'Abbeville's interpretation of the Song of Songs is one
that emphasizes the dynamic and dramatic unfolding of a programed
sequence
of events, "For this canticle unfolds like a prophecy, for people
are
transformed all of a sudden; times are transformed all of a
sudden."
[111]
D'Abbeville, like many of his contempories, turns the passionate
movements and yearnings of the lover and best-beloved in the Song
of Songs
to the understanding of the relationship between Christ and his
mother,
his spouse, the Church. And the audience participates in the ardent
relationship
as the adolescentulae, the daughters of Jerusalem, who witness
and
join in the events described. [112]
When the poet, the author of the Song of Songs declares,
"Ecce iste venit, saliens in montibus, transiliens colles,"
this
is interpreted as Christ striding between the hills and mountains and
crushing
them under foot. The hills signify the minor demons; the mountains
the devil
crushed by Christ, just as the prophet wrote, "Super aspidem et
basiliscum
et conculcans leonem at draconem." Similarly, to the poet's
question,
"Que est ista que ascendit per desertum sicut virgula fumi ex
aromatibus
mirre et thuris et universi pulveris pigmentarii?" d'Abbeville
responds
that this is the Virgin Mary ascending powerfully up from the world
that
is a desert.

The dramatic events of the Song are accompanied by bursts
of burning warmth, sweet odors and prolific foliage, just as the
events
depicted in the sculptural program. It will be remembered that the
invention
of the relics of Saint Firmin and their triumphal entry into Amiens
were
accompanied by just these signs of change. The entire cathedral
faade
is seen to be "changed" as it bursts into flower on its
northern
flank. The effect of the great rush of warmth generated by these
events
is the melt-down or liquification of the obstinate soul. D'Abbeville
identifies
this phenomenon most directly in relation to the verse from the
Song, "My
beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door and my bowels were
moved
by him." At this touch the soul is heated to the point of
liquification.
It is only in this state that the soul can accept the form imposed upon
it by the "artifex," namely the Holy Spirit. [113]
The use of the first person singular in the Song and in the
dean's exegesis allows the meaning to be transferred from the
interaction
between lover and beloved to the readers or listeners themselves.
Abbot
Suger might respond to the many-colored gems of the liturgical
equipment
of the altar of Saint-Denis in terms of an ecstatic hovering in a
remote
in-between realm. D'Abbeville, on the other hand, invites his
audience to
participate in the sudden rush and burst of warmth that melts down
obstinate
hardness, leaving the soul in an impressionable state.

It is with these thoughts that we may end. In the opening
sentences of my Preface the visitor (reader) was brought into sacred
space.
The power of the cathedral to liquify even the most hardened visitor
is
palpable on the astonished faces of those who enter the light-filled
nave
with its soaring spaces and repetitive forms. In their highly receptive
state visitors are induced to explore, gathering impressions; storing
and
manipulating them. While for many modern visitors this may be a
more or
less self-conscious aesthetic or intellectual experience, d'Abbeville's
sermons and commentaries serve as a reminder that this process of
reception
was not the end, but was rather the means to an end. That end was
nothing
less than the stamping or imprinting upon the softened surface of the
soul
of a series of powerfully interacting images that pertain to the idea
of
redemption through the Church. And the central image is that of
Christ himself,
stamped upon the soul at the point of entrance through the Beau
Dieu.
September 1994